Fred Kavli, Kavli Foundation donate $7.5 million to University
of Chicago for cosmological physics institute

The University of
Chicago will devote $7.5 million in donations from Fred Kavli and the Kavli
Foundation of Oxnard, Calif., to studying some of the most puzzling scientific
questions about the origin and evolution of the universe and the laws that
govern it.

The funds will make permanent the Center for Cosmological
Physics, established in 2001 by the National Science Foundation. The center will
be renamed the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics. The new institute is
one of seven being established by Kavli around the country and in Europe on
brain science, nanoscience and cosmology.

“My goal in establishing these
institutes is to support research at the frontiers of science,” said Kavli
Foundation Chairman Fred Kavli. “I feel that it is especially important to
pursue the most far-reaching opportunities and challenges and to seek answers to
the most fundamental unanswered questions.”

Kavli said he selected the
three areas of emphasis because they provide the greatest opportunity for major
scientific breakthroughs. “We selected the University of Chicago primarily
because of its research strengths in experimental and theoretical cosmology. The
presence of an interactive group of outstanding researchers supported by an NSF
Physics Frontier Center was also a factor.”

The University of Chicago is
proud to have the Kavli name associated with its rich tradition of research in
physics, astronomy and astrophysics, said University President Don Michael
Randel. “This tradition includes our alumnus Edwin Hubble, who discovered 75
years ago that the universe is expanding. With the generous support of Fred
Kavli and the Kavli Foundation, our scientists aim to make equally startling
discoveries in the years ahead.”

More than 90 scientists and students at
the new Kavli Institute carry out research that fuses cosmology with particle
physics. Of particular interest to the institute’s researchers are the following
questions: why is the universe expanding at an accelerating rate, did the
universe begin in a burst of expansion called inflation, and did a single
unified force influence the beginning of the universe?

The
interdisciplinary work pioneered by David Schramm at the University of Chicago
from 1974 until his death in 1997 has established that there are deep and
profound connections between the very small—quarks—and the very large—the
cosmos, said Michael Turner, the Bruce V. and Diana M. Rauner Distinguished
Service Professor in Astronomy & Astrophysics. Over the past two decades,
Chicago scientists have blazed the trails in this new approach to cosmology and
particle physics.

“The Kavli Foundation recognized the grand
opportunities to dramatically advance our understanding of both the universe and
the laws that govern it, and with this gift has expressed its confidence in the
ability of scientists at Chicago to take advantage of those opportunities within
our unique interdisciplinary culture,” Turner said.

Kavli Institute
Director Bruce Winstein said it is now generally recognized that particle
physics and cosmological physics are coming together very rapidly.

“We
think that is the most exciting and fruitful area in all the physical sciences,
and it promises to remain that way for some time,” said Winstein, who also is
the Samuel K. Allison Distinguished Service Professor in Physics at the
University of Chicago. “We are happy and proud that the Kavli Foundation has
made this very generous gift to our university to enhance our NSF Center. The
Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics has a very strong fellows program that
currently has 10 of the best young scientists hungry for this interdisciplinary
environment.

“Funding from the Kavli Foundation enables the expansion of
our mission: understand the earliest moments of our universe; identify the
composition and character of ‘dark matter’ and ‘dark energy’ and understand
their critical roles in the formation of galaxies; and understand the origin of
the very high-energy gamma and cosmic rays in the universe,” Winstein said.

The institute has already allocated $1 million of the Kavli funds to
develop and build an instrument that will enable NSF’s South Pole Telescope, led
by John Carlstrom, the S. Chandrasekhar Distinguished Service Professor in
Astronomy & Astrophysics at the University of Chicago, to make
ultra-sensitive measurements of the polarization of the cosmic microwave
background radiation, the afterglow of the big bang. Detection of particular
patterns in this polarization can reveal the physics of the universe in its
earliest imaginable stages.

The Kavli Foundation was founded by Fred
Kavli in 2000 to advance science for the benefit of humanity and to promote
increased public understanding and support for scientists and their work. The
foundation focuses its activities on three areas of basic research: cosmology,
the life sciences with emphasis on understanding the nature and evolution of
life and the human being, and nanoscience with initial emphasis on
bio-nanotechnology.

Kavli, a Norwegian-born physicist, business leader,
innovator and philanthropist, came to the United States in 1956. Two years later
he founded the Kavlico Corporation, which became one of the world’s largest
suppliers of sensors for aeronautic, automotive and industrial applications.

Kavli and the foundation support nine research institutes worldwide.
These include research institutes in neuroscience at Columbia University, Yale
University and the University of California, San Diego; in nanoscience at the
California Institute of Technology, Cornell University and the Technical
University in Delft, The Netherlands; in cosmology at Stanford University and
Chicago; and in theoretical physics at the University of California, Santa
Barbara.